


The Dangers Of Allowing Gossip Onboard

by timeisweird



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-22 16:35:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13170861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timeisweird/pseuds/timeisweird
Summary: “Yeah well, that’s what I’m for, I guess.  Got the badge and everything.”In which the TARDIS has some fun, Donna thinks of some brilliant ideas, and the Doctor gets a gift from a friend long since gone.





	The Dangers Of Allowing Gossip Onboard

**Author's Note:**

> thanks to [xander genocidaltheta](http://genocidaltheta.tumblr.com) and [tiny "tint" tinyscoop](http://tinyscoop.tumblr.com) for the inspiration and allowing me to write fics based on our discord conversations!
> 
> gender neutral pronouns for the doctor because i can

It starts off innocently enough - Well no, it doesn’t. It starts off as a way for Donna to talk to someone about the Doctor, someone who properly understands the absurdities of life aboard the TARDIS, before soon developing into something like a gossip circle. So really, it starts out with Donna mocking the Doctor.

She’s sitting in the console room, finishing her cuppa as she waits for the Doctor. For all they complained about her bringing half her wardrobe onboard, they certainly cared a lot about their own appearance. “Bloody alien can’t spend less than an hour on their hair,” she mumbles to herself, before downing the last bit of her tea.

There’s a mechanical whirring, and Donna looks up to see the time rotor piston once, twice - for a worrying second, she thinks the TARDIS has decided to take a little day trip while the Doctor is held up - before falling silent again.

Donna sets her cup down on the ground. “Now what’d you go and do that for?”

It’s a rhetorical question; sure, the Doctor has claimed many times that the TARDIS is alive, and she believes them, especially with the way doors tend shift around so that the library’s right there when you need it, or when she catches the Doctor in a quiet moment, softly talking to the ship as they tinker with the controls.

So it’s a bit of a surprise when she gets an answer in the form of a soft beeping from the console, and a - well, she can only describe the feeling as a brush against her consciousness. A gentle touch, filled with laughter and agreement.

She startles at first, then laughs as she realizes what’s going on. “How long have you had to put up with that ridiculous git? Poor thing.”

The conversation continues like that, her going on about whatever’s on her mind, and the TARDIS responding with a careful mixture of robotic bleeping, whirs, and mental nudges.

It ends up becoming a routine of sorts, the two of them talking - if you could call it that. On Thursdays (or whenever Donna decides to say it’s a Thursday. Time is meaningless in the TARDIS, after all) she takes up residence in the console room with a cup of tea and a plate of biscuits, and chats with the TARDIS as the Doctor’s off doing who-knows-what in the science lab or the library, or whatever room managed to pique his interest for more than a half hour.

This particular day, Donna has gotten up early (or she likes to think she has) and is sitting in the console room once more. Their conversations have developed the tendency to stray towards the Doctor - or at least, whatever ridiculous thing they managed to do. In all, it reminds her of the girls’ night out she would have with her friends back in Chiswick, where they went around talking about their partners. Both the good and the bad, of course.

This time, it had been quoting _Spongebob_ . “And, and _they_ said,” Donna went on, mimicking the Doctor’s tenor the best she could, “ _‘The inner machinations of my mind are an enigma’_ and then _I_ was like, _‘Hold on a minute, did you just quote a_ children’s cartoon _?’_ ”

A couple of lilting beeps answer her, but before she can think about what they mean, there’s a distressed “Oi!” from the right of her, and she turns to see the Doctor walking into the console room, looking at the time rotor like it personally insulted them.

She has to bite the inside of her cheek to keep herself from laughing anymore - _the look on their face!_

“I suppose this is one of those Thursdays, now isn’t it?” the Doctor asks as they cross the room over to the TARDIS console. There’s a brief moment of confusion on Donna’s end as to how they know, before she remembers - this had been one of the things she had brought up when they were stuck in jail together.

“Now Donna,” the Doctor says solemnly, though Donna can see the smirk on their face as they start working the controls. “I don’t expect you to understand the complexities of a Time Lord’s bond with their TARDIS - but _you_ ,” they address the TARDIS, “ought to know better.”  

“And besides,” they start conversationally as the TARDIS lands with a _thump_ . “Shouldn’t I be asking how you recognized a quote from a children’s cartoon, Miss ‘I only watch quality shows like _Project Runway_ and shows that haven’t even been released in my time’? They look over at her with a smug grin.

“Oi! _Stranger Things_ is good. That poor girl, y’know?” She retorts, and before they know it, they’re up to their shoulders in an plot to take over some poor moon, one that involves a soda bottle-making factory and a _very_ determined pair of glass robots.

Later, Donna walks into her bedroom - fresh from the showers, dressed in recently-laundered clothes, and thankfully clean of whatever alien oil they use for weird glass robots - to find a small piece of metal laying on her bed.

She picks it up, examines the shield-shaped object - a badge of sorts. Engraved in the gold metal is “Captain of the DRGWLT Crew.” There’s no hint as to what the acronym stands for, nor as to who left it on her bed.

Once again, there’s a gentle brush against her consciousness - it happens rarely enough to startle her each time -  and suddenly Donna understands the badge.

And then she bursts out laughing.

“‘The - the Doctor is a Ridiculous Git but We still Love Them’ Crew?” she eventually manages, in between gasps for breath. There’s a warm hum from the TARDIS. Oh, she has _got_ to show this to the Doctor - but not too soon! Let them notice it themselves.

When she walks into the console room after a nap, she makes sure that the badge is in plain sight, pinned neatly to the lapel on her jacket.

The Doctor doesn’t notice at first - in fact, they don’t notice until both of them are on an alien planet, purple skies and incredibly clear water, flora and fauna that all wear different shades of cool colors. It’s absolutely _gorgeous_ and takes her breath away for a multitude of reasons.

So, it’s a shame that the Doctor’s currently trying to get her to waterboard down a rushing river - on a _tree branch_ ! Well, more of a log really, but that’s not the point. Of all the possible things they could do here, such as have a nice picnic, or go on a hike, or _oh, I don’t know, not drown horribly in a rafting accident--_

“Come on, it’s traditional!” they enthuse as they drag her towards the river. “All the natives of Caprala do it. A rite of passing, of sorts. Still, completely open to offworlders, don’t worry.”

“Then how come no one’s doing it right now?” It’s a valid question, and definitely not just an attempt to distract them long enough for her to rescue her arm from their solid grip. The waterside is completely empty, devoid of life, native or offworlder.

“It’s probably just the off-season,” they reasoned.

“Oh no we don’t,” she snaps, digging her heels into the soft ground. _That_ gets them to stop. They look back at her, the confusion on their face turning into concern as they wonder what Donna’s doing. “Come on, haven’t you noticed? There’s _nothing_ here. You said it yourself, a while back - There should be dozens of animals around us. Kilometres of forests and rivers, and yet, I haven’t seen a single living thing besides me and you.” She manages to play it off like she hadn’t _just_ noticed a second before she opened her mouth, and that’s something she feels quite proud about.

The Doctor’s mouth forms a little _oh_ of surprise, before they break out into a eerily wide grin. “Oh brilliant! Brilliant Donna Noble!” They drop her hand and reach into their suit pocket to take out the sonic screwdriver. Immediately, they begin a scan of the surroundings.

She allows herself a smile. “Yeah well, that’s what I’m for, I guess.  Got the badge and everything.”

“The badge?” They ask absently, fiddling with the sonic’s settings, before looking at her properly. “What do you mean, the badge?”

It’s an odd thing for them to focus on, she thought. But, it did give her an excuse to flaunt her TARDIS-given gift. She showed them her lapel. “This badge. Found it on my bed this morning. Apparently it’s for...” she faltered. What was she gonna tell them? “Well--”

She’s cut off by the Doctor groaning, “Oh, not this again! I _told_ her…” they trail off into disgruntled muttering as they pocket the sonic and head back towards the TARDIs, leaving Donna standing next to a rushing river, blinking in confusion.

She jogs to catch up. They’ve already managed to cover most of the distance back to the ship - Dr. Long Legs is more like it, she thinks. “What?” she asks once she’s side-by-side with the Doctor again. “What’s wrong with the badge?”

“Nothing’s _wrong_ with the badge,” they say. “Perfectly nice badge. Quality metal, neat lettering, all around perfectly nice badge. It’s just well, the TARDIS likes to give them out to my companions sometimes - thinks it’s funny, she does. Evelyn had one. Peri did too, I think. Martha got hers almost right off the bat, before I even decided to let her stay onboard as a proper passenger.” They ramble like that for a bit, not letting her get a word in until they’re both back at the TARDIS.

The Doctor throws the doors open and rushes up to the console. Donna follows, curiosity piqued. They’re obviously looking for something amidst the controls, but what? “Aha!” they exclaim like a parent catching a child with their hand in the cookie jar. They grab at something.

She peers over their shoulder - it’s another badge, identical to the one on her lapel.

The Doctor’s pulling at the badge now, trying to get it to unstick from the console. “Now, come on old girl, you’ve had your fun, you can - stop - mocking - me - now,” they punctuate their words with a tug, resting their foot against the console and pushing off.

Donna leans against a coral strut and crosses her arms, waiting for the inevitable.

Predictably, their hands slip off the smooth metal, and they end up toppling backwards and falling on their arse. With their fall, they let out a rather undignified squak of alarm. The Doctor takes a moment to breath, resting against the grating, before sitting up and looking at Donna. “I deserved that, didn’t I?”

She can’t help but chuckle. “Why don’t you like the badges?”

They rub against their neck. “Well, it’s not much fun having your own timeship - and your friends! - calling you a ridiculous git, now is it?”

She sits down on the crash seat, watches them as they get to their feet and dust themselves off - Not that there’s any need to, really. “I don’t think she means it like that. It _does_ say ‘we still love them’ right in the name. And last I checked, the _them_ refers to you.”

They pout for a few minutes, fiddling with the TARDIS controls, but Donna can tell that they don’t really mean it. Something about the way they throw levers and push buttons - she’s seen them when they’re really down, as much of an understatement _that_ is.

Then, with a spin, the Doctor turns to Donna to say, “Right! So, I’ve detected massive particle matter traces from that planet, and no major life forms besides flora and bacteria, you were right. I’ve got a few working theories, of course, but do you think you’re up for a bit of investigating, Donna Noble?”

She raises an eyebrow. “Do I even have to answer that?”

Next Thursday, which is coincidentally the day after they managed to save a large assortment of Capralan animals from a intergalactic smuggling ring, finds Donna once again in the console room. The Doctor’s out looking for spare parts for the TARDIS, and Donna couldn’t find any desire to stand around in a greasy mechanic’s shop while two blokes haggle over prices.

She’s currently trying to get Netflix to stream on the monitor, but all she seems to be getting is alien soap operas - without any translation or subtitles, either. Maybe the screen in her room would be better, or maybe the TARDIS is just messing with her again.

For a second, she thinks it’s working as a video pops up and starts to play - but no, it’s a recording. Of the console room, nonetheless. When was this taken? And where? She glances around the room, but doesn’t see any cameras.

Donna turns her attention back to the monitor. On the screen, the Doctor has just rushed into the console room, headed straight for the controls. And then there’s _her_ , following them.

It’s from yesterday, she realizes, when she had told the Doctor about the badges.

And _then_ , she realizes the purpose of this video. Specifically, she realizes when she watches the Doctor fall flat on their arse. It ends abruptly, just before the Doctor speaks after sitting up.

“Did you _seriously_ record this for the laughs?” She asks the room. The video plays again, and she takes that as a solid yes. Maybe she should send this to Martha, she’d get a kick out of this. Or maybe she could just hang on to it, save it for a rainy day.

And _that’s_ when she gets the idea.

“D’you have a - camcorder somewhere?” Donna asks.

 

\---

 

Whenever the Doctor is alone - whether their traveling companion is sleeping, out visiting family, or gone - they tend to tinker with the TARDIS console. Sometimes for days on end, if no one stops them.

The Doctor’s been doing a lot of tinkering as of late.

There’s something wrong with the multi-spatial resonance chips. Well, there had been. They fixed it hours ago, but it never hurts to be thorough, does it?

A beeping sounds from above where the Doctor lay below the console, stripped wires and chunks of circuitry surrounding them.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll get it in a minute,” the Doctor mutters for the nth time. Just some distress signal or odd time trace the TARDIS discovered - They’ve a time machine, it doesn’t matter when they answer it.

The beeping sounds again - even more urgent and annoyed this time, if beeping could sound annoyed. They try to ignore it for some time, but eventually the incessant noise gets to them, and they give in.

The Doctor tosses aside their spanner carelessly. “Fine! Fine, fine, you win. What is it now?” In a moment, they’re on their feet, pulling the monitor around.

There’s no distress signal, no temporal distortion, nothing of concern.

Just a datafile on the screen, a video to be precise, ready to be played.

Despite their earlier reluctance, the Doctor has to admit: their interest is piqued.

They hit play.

 _A person is shown lying on a couch amidst an expansive library, book resting on their chest. Their head is resting dangerously close to the edge. “I don’t think I’ve_ ever _caught you asleep,” a feminine voice whispers off-camera. “Well, properly asleep. Once you took a cat nap when you were under the console repairing some whatsit. But I didn’t have my camera then, so--” They break off into a gasp._

_The camera switches around to face the woman abruptly. There’s a mischievous look on her face as she holds back her laughter._

_The video cuts forward. The person on the couch is much closer now, only a few feet away from the camera. The camera woman deliberately holds up an air horn, whispers, “this is for all those times you interrupted my beauty sleep with some crash landing or whatever” and presses the button._

_Another cut of the tape shows a shaky view of the camera woman’s face, laughing hysterically as she runs away. In the back, her friend can be seen running after her, rubbing their head. “Donna!” they shout. The woman laughs louder._

_The scene switches to a jittering view of a masculine-presenting person in a blue suit. Their hand fiddles with the camera’s settings for a moment, before they switch it around, giving the camera a good view of the inside of a refrigerator. There’s a pint of milk, coffee creamer, various produce of a multitude of colors, a few tupperwares of leftover cooking - some with sticky notes attached to them - jars of sauces and other bottles._

_Every single item has been fitted with a pair of googly eyes._

_The camera person sets the camera down inside the fridge, aiming it back towards themselves. They give it a wink and two thumbs up before shutting the door. The lights click off._

_The video must cut forward, because only a second passes before they click on again - though this time, the person opening the door is a woman in a fluffy purple bathrobe._

_She glances around the fridge for a moment, before stilling. Her mouth drops open slightly, mouthing the word ‘what’ a couple of times. And then she catches eye of the camera, and realization dawns on her face._

_“Doctor,” she says, addressing the camera. “You are the_ weirdest _person I have ever met.”_

_The door shuts on the camera, leaving it plunged in darkness. A slightly muffled “Doctor!” can be heard, and a moment later, loud laughter._

_The scene switches once more, this time to a large expanse of grey concrete. Various different formations can be seen, dips and hills, a tunnel, stairs with railings. A skate park._

_The camera is aimed at a person in a trench coat and dark shades, who stands on the edge of a half pipe. On their feet are sneakers - Heelys, to be precise - and they roll back and forth on the soles impatiently._

_“Okay… now!” A feminine-sounding voice says off-camera._

_The person gives the camera a thumbs up, before pushing off from the edge. They yell in joy as they skate down the concrete on their shoes, but the yell quickly turns into a surprised shout as they trip, stumble, and fall about three quarters of the way down._

_They land in a heap at the lowest point of the half pipe with a groan._

_For a moment, everything is silent. Only the camera woman’s bated breath and the song of nearby birds can be heard._

_Then the person breaks out laughing._

_“That was_ brilliant! _” they shout, pushing themselves up onto their elbows, still laughing. The camera woman zooms in on their friend, who’s beaming away._

_Then the camera shakes as she joins in._

_The scene changes. A hand pushes past the thick green foliage of a jungle as the recorder walks forward, following a masculine-presenting person who, against all better judgement it seems, is wearing a suit and a trench coat in the hot climate._

_The person turns around, a big grin on their face. There’s only a hint of sweat on their face. “Come on, Donna. Not far now.” Then, there’s a look of confusion as their eyes meet the camera. “What’s that for, then?”_

_“Oh, you know. Memories, fun, all that jazz,” a voice replies off-camera._

_The grin returns not a moment later, just before the person faces the jungle again. “All right then. Now, the source of the signal should be just over--” They break off suddenly, freezing in place._

_The camera shakes a bit as the camerawoman stumbles to a stop, narrowly avoiding her friend. “Oi, watch where you’re going, Doctor!”_

_They shush her gently as they stoop low to the ground, focused on something just off to the right of the path they’ve been cutting. “Oh, hello there,” they say softly._

_The camera stoops as well as the camerawoman searches for whatever had caught the person’s interest. “What? What is it?”_

_The person shuffles around on their feet, still crouched, and looks at the camerawoman - not the camera itself. Something’s cupped in their hand, and there’s a big grin on the person’s face._

_“Look Donna,” they say, unfurling their hands to reveal a small tree frog, pigments of bright blue streaked across its black skin. “How brilliant is that?”_

_“Oh, a frog,” the voice off-camera says, dead-pan._

_The person rolls their eyes and pushes their hands towards the camera woman. “But look at the pigmentation! How striking. Generally, it’s used to warn off any predators looking for a quick snack - indicative of toxicity, you see -- Oh.” The person stills, looking down at the frog in their hands._

_There's a pause. “Doctor,” the camerawoman warns. “Don’t tell me you just poisoned yourself.”_

_They give an awkward chuckle. “Oh, well, you know how it is, you want to show someone the wonders of Earth’s jungles, and you end up poisoned by a dart frog.” They blink and look down at their hands. “I must say, the poison’s pretty fast-acting--”_

_“Stop blabbering, you idiot, and drop the frog!” A hand reaches out to hit their arm, making them drop the frog, which hops away, startled. The camerawoman also startles as the frog passes her by. “Oh my God, are you gonna die?”_

_“Die?” The person repeats, incredulous. “Oh no, no, no, no, no, no, most certainly_ not _.” As they ramble, their words start to slur slightly. “Me, die from a little dart frog? Ridiculous. But uh--” they hiss, their gaze looking to something beyond the camera and the camerawoman. “I_ might _hallucinate a bit, it seems.”_

 _“What? What are you seeing?” But before they can answer her question, they sway a bit, and start to pitch forward. “Oh you’ve_ got _to be--”_ _  
_ _The video cuts abruptly to the camera woman's face. The background is the same jungle as previous, and as the camera moves away, the same person from before can be seen, leaning heavily against the camera woman's shoulder. Their head is down, resting against their chest as the two stumble across the terrain._

 _“See Doctor?” The camerawoman says, focusing in on the person. “_ This _is what happens when you touch random frogs in rainforests.”_

_The person’s head jerks up as they take a sharp breath. They look at the camerawoman, pupils as large as saucers. “Hm? Amy? That you?”_

_“Yeah hon,” she says, sparing a knowing glance to the camera. “You alright?”_

_“You sound - different, Pond. Less Scottish. What happened to the Scottish? I liked--” They suck in another breath, a hiss through their teeth. “Oh, oh no,” they groan, sounding a bit more coherent. “That’s not right - not right at all.”_

_The camera jitters as the camera woman adjusts the person’s arm across her shoulders. “You got that right, at least.”_

_The video cuts again. This time, all that can be seen is the muddy ground shuffling by. Off camera, the person rambles, their accent faltering oddly as they speak._

_“And then they tricked me! Jamie, Zoe, my best friends - they tricked me, put me in this, well, it was a bit like a Barbie doll case, now wasn’t it? Just needed a little label. Something like ‘The Doctor, now with three different outfits!’_

_“And I mean, I can’t really blame them, they_ were _fictional characters at the time. No free will whatsoever, actions trapped to the words on the page.”_

_The voice suddenly sighs, growing morose. “Oh, oh crumbs, I miss them. They can’t even remember me now! Time caught up with us, and the - my people wiped their memories. It always seems to do that. Time.” Their voice drops to a whisper, and their proper accent returns. “Please don’t let time catch up with you, Donna.”_

_The camera jerks slightly, as if the woman operating it hadn’t been aware they were talking to her._

_“I don’t - I don’t think I could bear it.” They fall silent, and it hangs in the air like the humidity of the forest. On screen, the ground moves along at a slow but steady pace._

_“Oh spaceman,” the camera woman breaths after some time, voice shaky. “Why’d you do this to yourself?”_

Back in the console room, the Doctor wipes away tears as the video - a compilation of recordings their best mate had made - continues to play. More jokes, more pranks and dumb discussions had late at night.

Some of the clips, they had forgotten about, to be completely honest, but others, they could remember like it were yesterday.

And it hurt.

The video's about to end, they can see it on the progress bar. But before they decide to pause the video, save themselves from another story ending, a clip of Donna addressing them catches their attention.

She’s in the console room, sitting on the jump seat. _“Right, listen up spaceman,”_ she’s saying. _“By now, you’re probably laughing or - no,”_ she squints at the camera, looking at something slightly to the left of the lens. _“The TARDIS says you’ll be - crying.”_ Her voice softens, and she whispers to herself, _“Maybe this was a bad idea.”_

Then she takes a breath, straightens her posture, collects herself. _“No, no this was a good idea, because I know you, Doctor. You might like to think you’re all high and mighty and mysterious, but the fact is, I know you well enough to know you need a little sunshine in your life._

_“Cause I know by the time you’re seeing this video, I’m gone. Don’t know how, or why, but you’re nine hundred years old, Doctor. No way I can compete with that.” She cracks a slight smile. “So, I made this little compilation - got the idea from when I was browsing the internet. You really gotta fix the time stabilizer whatsit. I keep getting sites from the late 2010s - Anyway, I made this compilation so that whenever you’re… feeling down, or just can’t seem to get out of your head, you can watch this video and just have a laugh once in a while. Also, the TARDIS might have put some clips in herself, you know she is.”_

_“So!”_ she claps her hands together. _“Go out there, do your thing - save the world - but don’t forget to look for the bright things in life, the sunshine. And - don’t forget about me neither, kay?”_

The video ends there, and the Doctor reaches over to turn off the monitor. They stare at the black screen for a moment, before they say, their voice hoarse, “Donna Noble, I don’t think I could forget you if I tried.”

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote most of this at 3am, so if any of it is incoherent or odd, then i'm terribly sorry!


End file.
